Today,
was a day to explore beautiful Melbourne, Australia and rehearse music
to be sung jointly by the Melbourne University Choral Society and
Morgan. The concert will be at St. Paul's Anglican Cathedral.
The
conductor of the Choral Society, Andrew Wailes met us at our hotel
early this morning. He was quite excited to lead the tour of his dear
Melbourne. Andrew is a very vibrant individual who gave colorful
commentary on every site seen today. We already new that there was a
rivalry between the two principal cites of Sydney and Melbourne. He
very enthusiastically shared with our group how he believed Sydney was
inferior to the great city of Melbourne. It was entertaining to hear
his perspective on stories of Australia already learned. We had a great
conversation questioning his views, but at the end of the day, he still
respective his sister city of Sydney. The Morgan contingent must agree
with Andrew, for our limited time spent in Melbourne, this is a greater
city in many respects than Sydney. One reason in our estimation was
simply the ingenuity of much of the architecture in Melbourne.
Our
first stop was to Australia's first site for Parliament, the Royal
Exhibition Building. Melbourne was once the capital of Australia. This
building was quite formidable with beautiful gardens and fountains
around the building. It is currently used for university examinations,
as this is one of the few places in Melbourne that can accommodate
finals for the large universities.
Our next stop was to
Melbourne's St. Patrick's Cathedral which has the distinction of the
tallest and overall largest cathedral in all of Australia. Many of the
older buildings in Melbourne were quite opulent due to wealth garnered
from Australia's Gold Rush which somewhat mirrored ours in the United
States. The architectural design of this church was quite different
than most cathedrals. Rather than having stained glass around the
church, most of the glass was golden, which gave a very unique look to
the cathedral.
From there we drove to the Shrine of Remembrance,
the Melbourne War Memorial. Since we just visited the National War
Memorial in the capital city of Canberra, we had a point of reference to
compare. The Melbourne memorial was originally built for World War I
only, as it was built prior to World War II. It was designed after the
pyramids in Egypt. Much like the Egyptians, they built this structure
to use Sunlight to mark time. Once a year on the 11th hour, of the 11th
day, of the 11th month, the structure is constructed to gleam sunlight
for 11 minutes on the tomb of the unknown soldier from this war.
November 11, is the most reverent holiday in Australia - Day of
Remembrance. The holiday commemorates soldiers from both Australian and
New Zealand fallen soldiers. It is this war that robbed 2 out of every
4 qualified men in Australia to fight in World War I. The Australians
refer to this occurrence as a "lost generation", as so many died in this
war, relative to Australia's size as a country. You will notice that
the tombstone of the unknown soldier simply reads: "Greater Man Hath No
Man" - a statement taken from Christian doctrine. The structure is
designed so that once a year, on November 11 - Day of Remembrance -
that the sun's light will shine on the tomb and stop on the word
"love". At first thought, this is a remarkable feat of engineering,
however, if the Egyptians did similar feats with the sun over 2000 years
ago, I guess that we should be able to perform this in 21st century.
Andrew
Wailes was so very excited for our choir to be in Melbourne, that he
purchased tickets for us to go to the top of Eureka Towers. Eureka
Towers was the tallest residential apartment building in the world when
it was built in 2006, however it was soon eclipsed by the HHHR
residential tower in Dubai. Eureka Tower is 91 stories high.
Although many in the group have been in similar buildings, like the
Empire State Building, because the day was clear, as most of their
winter days are in Australia, we all concluded that this had to be one
of the best views ever of urban life. One of the points that was easily
seen from above was the site of the Australian open. This site was
beside the former Olympic stadium from the 1956 Olympics held in
Melbourne. Another unique architectural feat was the Australian Arts
Center which design is a Melbourne landmark. The Art Center has a spire
was designed in the shape of a ballerina's tutu. The building from afar
resembled the Eiffel Tower, until you saw the skirt on the top of the
building.
Beyond traveling to the top of the Eureka building,
many persons in the group paid to go on an attraction at the top of the
building called the Edge. We were extended 4 meters beyond the
building, with nothing below but glass, and looking below over 80
stories. Again, a site that we will never forget, who were brave enough
to go!
We again had another well-crafted group meal for lunch.
After
lunch we went to an Aborigine presentation at the Botanical Gardens.
Two persons of Aborigine descent gave an Aborigine Presentation and
Walk around the gardens. They shared with the group their customs. As
we walked around the gardens, they discussed how they used the land to
survive, but more importantly, how they respected to land - mother
earth. You will notice some photos of choir members embracing a
Eucalyptus tree. The entire presentation was quite informative. At the
end of the presentation, Dennis the leader gave a heartfelt talk about
what the land meant to him and his people. I recorded his eight minute
soliloquy. Please listen to the attached soundfile so that you might be
able to get a real insight into what the Aborigine people endure.
Their plight is very similar to the American Indian.
After
our tour, our next scheduled event on the itinerary was to attend a
rehearsal with Andrew Wailes. At the end of the concert tomorrow, the
Morgan State Univeristy Choir the Andre's group, the Melbourne
University Choral Society will jointly sing the 2nd half of the concert
tomorrow evening, after Morgan sings the first half of the concert. We
had a group numbering well over one hundred voices in rehearsal. Andrew
will conduct Lauridsen's Lux Aeternam. I will conduct the three pieces
that I brought from the states. The rehearsal was long, but warranted
and effective. The concert is slated to be close to sold-out at 1000+
seat cathedral. Tomorrow promises to be a great conclusion to a great
Australian tour. See attached a iPhone scanned image of a flyer for
tomorrow night's program.
More to come. . .
P.S. - We
had a little excitement at the hotel this evening as alarms rang around
midnight due to a smoke detector engaged. Luckily, it was only a false
alarm!
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